


Into the Valley of Death

by beyonces_fiancee



Series: The Knight and Her Lady [2]
Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Medieval, Chivalry, Death, F/F, Gore, Historical Accuracy, Hurt/Comfort, Intimacy, Knights - Freeform, War, pearl martyrs herself both physically and emotionally
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-26
Updated: 2016-05-26
Packaged: 2018-07-10 10:42:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6981094
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beyonces_fiancee/pseuds/beyonces_fiancee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>A soft breeze stirred the dry grass, raising a whisper and rustle of dead husks. A pounding filled Pearl's ears. Beyond these mouselike stirrings the field of battle was silent. She was alone under the blistering sun.</i>
</p>
<p>Medieval AU Pearlrose. Pearl is a knight who has fallen in battle and failed her liege.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Into the Valley of Death

**Author's Note:**

> My love and gratitude to [Anarfea](https://www.archiveofourown.org/users/Anarfea), who helped me edit this strangely and painfully intimate story.

A soft breeze stirred the dry grass, raising a whisper and rustle of dead husks under the staring sun. The field of battle was silent. A pounding filled Pearl's ears. Steel points of the blacksmith's making burned within her, strange objects buried in the flesh of her body, splitting thew and sinew to leave rut-tracks of fire. Splinters itched in her fingers. The fletches of the arrows stuck inside her whined in the breeze, as though longing to tug free of their target, to sing again through the air and taste anew the blood of an enemy. Beyond these mouselike stirrings there lay over the world a stifling blanket of silence. She was alone under the blistering sun, with only the wind and the carcases of her fallen friends for comfort. No one would come to her.

A raid had been planned on the enemy's camp, horsewomen and foot-soldiers on the march, swathed and hidden in the haze of early morning. The army had smashed on the camp like a wave against great boulders on the shore, but had scattered in dismay and fallen away like the white foam subsiding.

The brave deeds dreamed in the general's tent had crumbled as the gallant charge became a rout, a flight, swordswomen cut down left and right. Pearl on her great war-horse had wheeled to close with the advancing enemy, screaming defiance until the blood flew speckled from her mouth, surrounded on all sides by grimacing faces. Two arrows, lodged deep in her left thigh, encumbered her as she drove her horse forward. The pain curdled her stomach, but she bore the banner of the Lady of the Rose Kirtle, and she held it high with shaking arms and continued the charge. There would be one warrior left standing at the end, if only one.

A shout from her sergeant, fallen behind: "Lieutenant!" Pearl wrenched around in the saddle, sword flaming bright, but alack! her blow fell too late to save her. A third arrow struck her shoulder in the place unguarded between cuirass and spaulder, landing like the crack of a fiery whip, and she was knocked from her horse, and of the combat knew no more.

Now, friend and foe alike had departed the scene, leaving mounds of bodies unburied in their wake. The mist had burned away with the rising of the sun, the crows had come, and a hollow silence rose from the slain as surely as the stench of blood. Pearl, lying shattered on the field, grieved her loss the only way now possible to her: with the suffering of her body, pain wracking her flesh even as it ran rampant through her mind. She had failed her battalion; she had disgraced the name of the Lady Quartz; she had lost the lives of her dearest friends. She imagined the rendezvous with her general and liege-lady, should she survive to seek her company once more. Never before had it been her duty to deliver news of such despair.

_The hall was still and cold. The Lady Quartz's eyes were icy in their rage. Kneeling, Pearl spoke to the floor. "My lady, we have suffered a grievous defeat. The foe closed with us before our earliest expectations, and our finest cavalry were cut down on every side. There was no hope of victory after the first charge was vanquished."_

_"How dare thou come to me, bringing news of loss and death to fling at my feet like a dog ashamed—"_

But that could not be. Pearl knew by the grace of God that she had fought her best contest on the field today, wounded and robbed though she was of her skill. Moreover, she knew that her general's tactics were not mis-thought, only that the enemy had proved too doughty a challenge for even the Lady's mind.

_"It grieves my heart that thou shouldst have failed so, though it not be thy fault—"_

_"I was a fool to send my right hand in my place—"_

A thousand possibilities crowded her mind, making her heart race, and her wounds throbbed in time with the rising drumbeat. In truth, Pearl knew not what the Lady would say. Nor how Pearl herself would ever live to see her sweet face again. She was weary, dogged by thirst and tortured by the sun's fire. If she summoned all her failing strength to draw the shafts free from her body, the heads might break off in the wounds, and cause the flesh to fester; and her dearly-bought freedom of movement would falter, and ere long the putrescent arrow-holes would bring her once more to her knees. If she left the arrows untouched, there was no hope of rising to seek out her lady, nor any of her kinswomen who may yet have survived the fight, and she would die bleeding in squalor, alone amid the wreckage of her failed campaign.

She seemed to see the Lady Quartz looming over her, shimmering in the heat. Pearl's heart grew bold and strong at the sight of her liege-lady; she had not let the rose-figured banner fall; she had not cringed back, but won forward ground to her very last breath. _Her great broadsword was sheathed at her hip and her mighty rose-bedecked shield hung at her back. She was bathed chest-deep in the gore of those who had tried to destroy her. The Lady stood very straight, with a hard, shining look on her face._

_"Lieutenant, thou hast acquitted thyself nobly. Death in the throes of glory is worth a thousandfold more than cowardly life snatched from the enemy's hand in full flight."_

"Yes, my lady," Pearl mumbled. Her eyes burned in the sight of her liege, lashes spiky with blood. _She rose to her knees to kiss the Lady's ring and to make obeisance to her general, who had guided her lieutenant and the army at her command to the gates of heaven._

_"Thou art well deserving of sleep, faithful one, but thou canst not yet taste that reward. One more duty yet rests on thy shoulders."_

Pearl moaned. "I cannot..." The heavy burden of the world weighed down her trembling frame. She could no more rise to meet it than she could slay a dragon. Nor could she rise to stand, to find her lost battalion, to find her lady, to avenge her fallen sisters-in-arms. Her soul soared on wings above the battlefield, beating against the constraints of mortality, but her traitor flesh would not heed the call.

_"Thy duty is this: to lead one more charge on the enemy. Let thy wounds and thy weariness fall from thee as down from a fledging eagle. Though it be thy death, yet the enemy must be slain. This I demand of thee, pearl. Thy life, my devoted pearl, in my service. I can ask nothing less."_

_"This I will do for you and more, my liege," pearl promised._ Her eyelids would not close over aching-dry eyes; she circled her peeling lips with the tip of her parched tongue. _Even unto death would she stagger forward, rose banner flapping in the hot stinking wind, sword-tip trembling and thrust out at the end of her bloodied arm, to strike down one more of the Lady's foes. To defend her liege from ignoble death, if only once more before the darkness fell._

With a convulsive effort, she lurched up onto one elbow, staring up into the sky. "This I... this I will... my lady..."

"Pearl!"

The cry echoed in Rose's voice across the field, and Pearl jerked to attention, fell back consumed with pain. Another gossamer dream sent by her feverish brain, fancies as hopeless as thoughts of sweet-water oases consuming one lost in the desert. The sound of running feet came to her ears as faint as a memory. The only thing that seemed real was the pain.

But it was the truth, no mere dream or vision, as Rose fell at her side and seized her hand. Her great bulk kneeling over Pearl was like an oak tree mature in its years, casting shade and exerting a solemn gravity under its branches. One wished to lean against it, to fling one's arms about its girth, to weep against it and breathe the smell of green growth. Hope of hopes; unlooked-for miracle of miracles; the Lady, here, kissing _her_ hand, calling _her_ name, seeking to save her, however futile the chance might be.

"Oh, my dear one... my sweet friend..."

The Lady fumbled with the buckles of Pearl's cuisse, frantic in her haste, and ripped aside the under-clothes around the wound. Pearl's gaze swam in and out of focus as she stared down at the arrows protruding from her shoulder and hip. The sight of her flesh deformed and tightened bloodily around the arrow-hafts was not one she wished to linger upon. But these agonies were nothing when set against the presence of her lady, here to offer aid and comfort: Rose, her own, the Lady Quartz of the House of Crystal. Her shallow breaths she made an effort to deepen and soften, despite the stabbing pain in her chest, and she looked up into the Lady’s eyes with a watery smile.

"And thy sweet nose! 'Tis broken, I am sure..." Rose skimmed her fingertips across the curve of Pearl's nose, almost touching, but cringing away from contact at the poor crooked bridge.

"It matters not, Lady," said Pearl faintly. "Thou'rt with me now."

The Lady squeezed her hand. "These wounds will sour soon... Art hurt more than thou canst bear?"

"N-no, my lady..."

The Lady Quartz's eyes welled in anguish as she drew the thin-hilted dagger at her belt. "Then, canst thou bear one more hurt for me?"

Pearl said "Yes" before she understood what import the Lady's dagger bore. The answer would always be "Yes" to any question the Lady asked of her, anything the Lady desired of her, whether small or mighty, whether the gift was a foolish trifle or her heart's hot blood. Yes, yes, yes.

Two snaps as of wood breaking rang in quick succession, and a nauseating slash scored her thigh across the face of her wounds. Pearl screamed, then retched as huge fingers plunged into the raw meat of her body, scrabbling for the shaft, seeking the barb-tipped head. The world seemed to swim and dip, and the tears that fell from Rose's eyes were burning-hot salt on the naked skin of her thigh.

"I will heal thee," panted Rose, "I will heal thee, fear not, dearest, fear not, only a moment more..."

And as if by magic, the fingers’ probing agony withdrew from the wounds, and the burning lumps of steel were gone as well. Blood coursed in a cleansing trickle down her hip, bright red and thick, making her dizzy. The torturous process was repeated again on the arrow stuck in Pearl's shoulder; but knowing what was to come, she mustered all her courage to the sticking point, and cried out hardly at all as the shaft was snapped and the head extracted.

Cool, metallic water splashed over Pearl's face, and she opened her mouth desperately. Like ambrosia from heaven it poured down her throat, like the tears of angels, like sweet wine drunk from a skin in the green-dappled shade. After those few perfect mouthfuls, too soon, the flask dripped dry, and her head fell back to the yellowed turf.

"Speak to me, dear one," the Lady urged. "Pearl, my own dear Pearl, speak to me. Pearl!"

Pearl took a deep shuddering breath. "I thank thee, my lady... but thou hast helped me enough. There are others that need thee more..." It was a bitter fruit to swallow, to think that the Lady's succor was lavishly spent on her while her other followers languished in what state God only knew. Unable to cry out, smote by many wounds, they might be alone just as she had been, collapsed under the sun.

The Lady's face twisted with an emotion half affection, half gnawing grief. "There is no one else. I sought them all the morning but found no one."

No one, Pearl knew, whose mortal frame still held her soul. No one whose face was not smeared with blood, unrecognizable under battle-dust and sun-blisters, or broken beneath the hooves of war-horses in mounting rows. Pearl turned her gaze away from the Lady's in shame. She had found no one who had escaped with as light a burden of pain as she, with her paltry arrow-wounds, or as the Lady, with her off hand swollen and purple and a self-administered poultice tight around her lower ribs.

"Even if thou art the only one left alive, I will bring thee back home, and heal thee," said Rose. "Even if thou art the only one I will h-heal thee..." Her voice broke with sobbing, and Pearl clutched at the great hand resting on her bosom.

"But I am not... not the only one, Lady," she mumbled. "Thou art breathing yet."

And Rose, weeping so that the tears streamed down her face, kissed her mouth, and Pearl kissed her in return, and a cloud passed across the sun. A breath of cool wind stirred Rose's hair, and her curls brushed against Pearl's bloodied cheek; and in the sweltering air a soft rumble of thunder broke the silence.

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoyed this, please [visit me on tumblr (18+)](http://killmewithlesbians.tumblr.com/tagged/pearlrose).


End file.
